man on the street learns about backwards

Ziffel

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Here's another I haven't seen since at least 1975; but saw it a lot of times before that; and found it to be enjoyable and memorable:
A man (rather elderly) is walking down a busy street sidewalk and a voice says to him, "Excuse me sir, do you know what forwards means?" He says, "Forwards? Just... going forwards." The voice then says, "Okay, do you know what backwards means?" The man says, "Backwards? Listen, I'm a very busy man, I don't have time for this right now." Then the voice says, "Okay then I'll show you what backwards means."
Then the man watches as people and vehicles (including a fire engine) all start going backwards. I really liked the music throughout. After a little while of this, the voice then asks the man, "Now do you know what backwards means?" and the man proudly demonstrates by walking backwards. The voice then enthusiastically says, "Very good!" but when the man and everyone else continues to move backwards, he says "Okay you can all go forwards now... c'mon everyone go forwards... PLEASE go forwards!" But everyone's apparently having too much fun going backwards, and the segment ends that way.
 

SesameMike

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Among the "backwards" events the man was shown: someone walking his dog backwards, an airplane taking off backwards (actually landing, right? Or was that the other way around?). The one that stands out in my mind was when the man looks inside a restaurant and sees the owner "unwriting" the daily special, with a piece of chalk, on that display blackboard they usually had before the days of whiteboards and those funky clear boards with day-glo markers you often see today. The man actually asked the restauranteur "How did you do that?". He answered, "Do what?"
 

mikebennidict

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another thing about the film witch i didn't notice early on and the announcer was telling everyone to go backwards, a subway sign in the backround probably saying to downtown Phillidelphia. i would of thought that it would be filmed in NYC and even though both cities are not that far apart still they're not super close. interesting.
 

Censored

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Interesting to think about how that film was made. Filming the man walking backwards on the street, while everyone else naturally goes forwards, and then simply playing it in reverse for the show.
 
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